Best Soundfonts For
The soundfont linked below is one that took me about a week to make. I searched and found all of the best (out of at least 3 or 4 hundred soundfonts I tried. Here is a large collection of free soundfonts and free soundfont players to download. The soundfont instruments include Bass, Guitar, Piano, Synth leads.
This aim of this site is to provide high quality SoundFonts (virtual musical instruments in sf2 format) that can be played using a midi keyboard connected to a computer, tablet or smart phone. Emphasis has been placed on real or acoustic instruments particularly piano and other favourites for keyboard players (pads, strings, electric pianos, organs and orchestral) but some SoundFonts here also include high quality guitars, some synths and ethnic instruments.
There is also a nice GM set for playing general midi files. The SoundFont format sf2 is widely supported by lots of programs/apps and devices. If you are using the bs-16i or similar app try changing the Rx. Channel for say the first 8 channels all to 1. Cp Goerz Serial Numbers. You will then have 8 easily accessible sounds to play at the touch of the Solo/Mute button.
You can then mix for instance piano and pads together. Alternatively you could leave the channels 1 to 16 and use channel select to choose your favorite sounds. To play two sounds together just put them on the same channel. This is handy for pianos where you can add the level of resonance you prefer. When layering sounds with piano choose the non resonance piano versions (available in all the SoundFonts) to avoid lack of polyphony problems. This project began as a quest to find a really good software piano.
Not even the expensive commercial versions were satisfying to my ears. Most had velocity switching problems and unpleasant tones. I came across the University of Iowa Steinway piano samples which were great but there was room for improvement in the way they were presented. My goal was to have a selection of piano and other instruments that were pleasant to play and to keep them available for free.
Using SoundFont editing programs Polyphone and Viena I have done some editing to allow for expression to give a more enjoyable and realistic playing experience where timbre changes gradually with velocity where possible and without that annoying jump that is commonly found. This was applied to many of the other instruments as well. Live Peace In Toronto 1969.
Nice-Keys-Extreme-2.0 Still a big SoundFont set at 1gb or 1000mb (645mb dedicated to 3 pianos with 6 velocity layers). Similar to the top set but the main piano is a little less detailed so it leaves room for an extra piano (Steinways).
PC users should not have any problems or if running on iOS this set runs perfectly well on iPhone 6s or iPad Air 2. It is still possible to load this set within the bs-16i app and run Sweet Midi Player app using GM set one at the same time for midi backing if required.
This set has everything described below plus the addition of guitars. Some versions on this site have been carefully edited down to 6 velocity layers and looped at the almost inaudible tail ends to reduce Ram usage but the quality is almost indistinguishable. They are based on a nicely sampled Yamaha C5 Grand. Samples have been normalised, re-attenuated, latency reduced and modified for sf2. Three or more brightness levels are available plus optional resonance. Nice-4-Bass-V1.5 This is an sf2 simplified version o f three different basses - all with 4 velocity layers. It includes the 1958 Otto Rubner double bass played and mapped by Drogomir Smolken, recorded by Ludwik Zamenhof.